Well this was different; by today's standards anyway. As for the 80s, it fits in perfectly. While perhaps a bit dated on the special effects front, Lifeforce is still suprisingly effective in creating discomfort and puzzlement in its viewers, even if it does so between laughing fits instigated by scenes that have become hard to take seriously. Of course, the same could be said of the film as a whole. The discovery of three naked hibernating bodies in the a spaceship idling in the tail of Haley's comet leads to the unleashing of choatic madness in the streets of London. When the hibernators are brough back to earth, it is soon discovered that they are not human but alien beings that feed off the lifeforce of humans, literally sucking them dry and transforming them in to near-dead beings who need to suck life themselves before shatering into petrified dust. Much could be said about the psychological implications of the principal threat coming in the form of a naked woman (Mathilda May) who gets her energy fix through kissing, sucking the life out of her victims' mouths. When the colonel (Steve Railsback) of the original, presumed-dead team that discovered the aliens is found in an escape pod, he soon realizes that he is the only one that can put an end to this whole mess. Joined by a federal cop (Peter Firth), he sets out to find the deadly succubus he has unleashed on the world.
While the film sometimes slips and falls narrative-wise, Lifeforce is still rather lots of fun, the graphic nature of its horrors still strong enough to induce awe and disgusted giggles. The entire ordeal is greatly aided by Hooper's polished imagery, his welcomed visual sensibility imposing itself on the looseness of the script in what seems like an attempt to make us forget its ficitional discrepancies. While not as career-defining as Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974) or Poltergeist (1982), Lifeforce still testifies to Hooper's creative talent and proves itself an emblematic product of its time.
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